Farewell Jeff Chang
by cartoonman412
Summary: Adelaide gets a telephone call from their Grandma Felicia and she tells Becca and Sid that their Grandpa Jeff's in the hospital and not doing well and might be on the verge of dying.


1 Wednesday morning in the spring time, Adelaide was about to head out the door to wait for the school bus, when the wireless telephone rang. Seeing that she was closest to the telephone, she answered it.

"Hello?" Adelaide spoke right into the telephone upon answering it.

"Why hello there, Adelaide, it's your Grandma Felicia, is your father there?" Felicia replied to her.

"No, Grandma Felicia, Dad went out to open the Great Lakes City Diner with Mr. Loud, and I'm about to leave for school, can I take a message, please?" Adelaide asked her while grabbing a pen right by the phone and pulling the pad of sticky notes near him so he could take down a message.

"Just tell your father that your Grandpa Jeff doesn't have much time left to live." Felicia said to her.

Adelaide's heart sank in her chest, just as she stood there, not able to speak, her mouth was wide open and while she was only in 1st grade, she wasn't too peculiar with death and dying and she knew their Grandpa Jeff's time might come, but she wasn't expecting it real soon.

"Adelaide? are you still there?" Felicia asked her right after it had gone silent for a couple of minutes on account of Adelaide's surprised reaction.

"Uh… Yeah… Grandma Felicia…. I'm… Right… Here…" Adelaide stammered a bit while trying to hold back the tear drops.

"Did you get the message? about Grandpa Jeff?" Grandma Felicia asked him again.

"Yes, Grandma Felicia, I'll make sure to give Daddy the message." Adelaide replied to her just as Becca and Sid walked right into the kitchen while Becca was carrying Adelaide's lunch bag.

"Well I gotta go to school, bye, Grandma Felicia." Adelaide said to her while hanging up the wireless telephone and looking right up at Becca who stood right before her.

"Adelaide? who was that on the telephone with you?" Becca asked her.

"That was Grandma Felicia, Mother, Grandpa Jeff's not doing too well and he may be on the verge of… of…I can't even say it." Adelaide stammered a bit while nearly prepared to break down again.

Becca put Adelaide's lunch bag down and put her right hand on Adelaide's right shoulder.

"I understand that Grandpa Jeff's super special to you and Sid, I'll tell you what, I'll speak to your father, and right after school, we'll see to going and paying him a visit, but of course, both of our cars are in the shop, right after your father getting that flat tire yesterday, and mine having to go in for an oil change, so we'll need to take a taxi cab, but we'll see what we can do, now you 2 need to be running along to school, the school buses will be here shortly." Becca said to her while handing Adelaide her lunch bag and walking right with her to the front door.

"Alright, Mother, thanks a bunch." Adelaide said to her while giving Becca a wrap around her legs right before grabbing Sid's right hand and walking towards the bus stop.

The bulk of that entire day at school was uneventful for Adelaide just as she found herself in a fog too worried about Jeff to concentrate on anything at all. Then came lunch time and she sat right down at her usual table with Lisa, David and Carl. Adelaide opened up her lunch bag, tore open the sandwich bag with her strawberry cream cheese and red raspberry jam sandwich inside when she felt somebody tapping on her right shoulder. She turned right over to see that Carl had sat right down with his warm lunch he got from the school cafeteria kitchen

"Adelaide, are you alright? you seem a bit distracted today." Carl asked her due to a look of worriness on his face.

"No, Carl, it's my Grandpa Jeff, he's in the hospital." Adelaide said to him while leaning right into Carl's ear to whisper something to him.

"I think he might be…" Adelaide whispered to Carl, but she couldn't bring herself to say the final word.

"Don't worry about it, Adelaide, he's in the hospital, right? I'm pretty sure he'll be just perfectly fine." Carl whispered back to her while hoping to cheer his best friend for life and 1 true love up a bit.

While ordinarily, she'd take her best friend for life and 1 true love's word of advice, she knew deep down Jeff didn't have too much time to live, but thinking about it only made her more upset. It was all she could do most of that day to keep the tear drops from coming to her eyes, not wishing to cry and weep in front of the other young kids in school. she had been nervous about crying and weeping in school ever since she was in kindergarten when she fell over on the playground and cried and wept 'cause she hurt her knee cap and while the kindergarten teacher came right over and helped her in to the school nurse's office, she couldn't help but notice the twin bullies in particular, laughing at her and calling her a cry baby. Embarrassed by this, she swore to never break down in tear drops in school again, and now, here she was, 3 years later, on the verge of wanting to cry and weep, but not wishing to face the embarrassment again on top of losing 1 of the few maternal grandparent figures that had always been there for her just as long as she could remember. she went back to eating her lunch meal while trying to put Jeff outta her mind, not saying much to either Lisa, David and Carl, who were talking about the latest _Justice Pals_ movie they had all gone to see last Friday afternoon together as always at the movie theater and while Adelaide did enjoy the movie, he wasn't much in the mood to speak so only put his own input in if he was spoken to.

"Wasn't it amazing how the Justice Pals destroyed those evil giant Lizards, Adelaide?" Lisa asked him.

"Oh yeah, it was super thrilling." Adelaide replied to them in between sips of her mixed berry apple juice that she brought from home this morning.

The school bell rang and everybody went right outside where Adelaide sat on 1 of the benches right up by the school building and watched her good friends play hopscotch and just as it was all she could do to concentrate during the morning time, she found the exact same trouble arose that afternoon. she was just grateful to come right at the end of the entire day that she was never called on to recite a poem. chances were that she was so out of it. it was today with Jeff being on the verge of dying.

Right before she knew it, the school bell rang again and she got right on the school bus where he took a seat right by the window and looked right out the window all the way home and not speaking with anybody at all. No sooner had he arrived home when a big yellow taxi cab was sitting right in the driveway. she was curious enough to see what was going on around here.

"Come on, Adelaide, let's go." Becca called to her from inside the taxi cab.

"Okay, Mother, I'm coming with you." Adelaide called back to her while approaching the back door of the taxi cab and opening it.

"Where are we going?" Adelaide asked her while climbing right into the cab and closing the door right behind her.

"We're picking up your father from the Great Lakes City Diner and heading right up to Perry-Conway Memorial hospital where Grandpa Jeff is being stationed, I received another telephone call from your Grandma Felicia today and he doesn't have much time left to live, it'll be good if he's still alive when we get there, neither 1 of our cars were ready to be picked up at the mechanic's so your father and I agreed to take a taxi cab up there so you guys could see Grandpa Jeff and tell him goodbye." Becca explained to her as the taxi cab driver pulled right outta their driveway and headed right in the direction of the Great Lakes City Diner.

Luckily when they arrived, Stanley was waiting right out front at which point, Becca moved to the back seat and let Stanley ride in front ever since he suffered from motion sickness if he rode in the back seat.

"Thanks a bunch for watching over things while I'm gone out, Lyndon." Stanley called to them from the taxi cab while waving to 1 of his co-workers who was in the doorway.

"No problem, Stanley, good luck with everything." Lynn Loud Sr. called to him as Stanley closed his door, buckled his seatbelt and very soon, they were on their way to Perry-Conway Hospital.

It was a super long drive just as Jeff lived an hour away and Jeff was stationed at the hospital in their home town, but the drive felt especially long enough to Adelaide this time. To pass the time, she decided to work on a little bit of her spelling skills. Becca had her call out D words to her.

"Adelaide, spell the word, daring." Becca said to her.

"Uh… D-A-R-I-N-G." Adelaide replied to herself a bit unsure if she was getting it right or not.

"That's right, now spell the word, dimples." Becca said to her again.

"Uh… Um…D-I-M-P-L-E-S?" Adelaide asked her once again unsure.

"Good save there, Adelaide." Becca said to her.

They continued on right through the rest of the spelling words which were all words that began with the letter D for that week and while Adelaide got them correct, she wasn't having any difficulty. However, they arrived at Perry-Conway hospital.

"We're here." The taxi cab driver said to them.

"Thanks a bunch, kind sir." Stanley said to him while paying him the cab fare and the Chang family members piled right outta the taxi cab right on to the curb near the hospital entrance.

Adelaide gulped nervously upon getting outta the taxi cab 'cause being near hospitals made her a bit nervous.

"What seems to be the matter, Adelaide?" Sid asked her while noticing her younger sister was looking nervous.

"It's just that I don't like hospitals that much, Sid." Adelaide replied to her while leaning in close to Becca and Stanley for support.

"Don't worry about it, Adelaide, we'll be right with you, and I'm pretty sure a warm smiling face from Grandpa Jeff will cheer you up a bit, it always does." Sid said to her.

But Adelaide wasn't only a similar spirited person to Lana and Lola in times like this, always looking on the good side of things, even at age 6, she didn't have quite the exact same concept of death that Ronnie Anne had while seeing their Great Uncle Marvin still alive and just as far as she knew, they had never lost anybody important to them before, but however, she didn't wanna possibly begin an argument with her older sister so she remained silent just as the entire family walked right into the hospital and went right up to the receptionist's desk to find out where Jeff's hospital room was.

"We're here to pay Grandpa Jeff a visit." Becca said to the receptionist who was sitting right behind the desk.

The receptionist typed some things on the computer screen then she turned her attention back to Becca.

"He's upstairs in room 413, take the elevator to the 7th floor, it'll be the 4th room on your right down the hallway." The receptionist said to them while pointing in the direction of the elevators.

"Thanks a bunch, ma'am." Becca said to him.

The Chang family members got on the next elevator and went right up to Jeff's hospital room and when they got there, they saw Felicia hunched right over the hospital bed where Stanley' s father was lying in tear drops. She was terribly upset that she didn't even hear the entire family come in here.

"Mom? Dad? we're here." Stanley said to them while coming right up behind his mother who turned around startled by his presence.

"Stanley, this isn't easy for me to tell you, but your father's gone for good." Felicia whispered to him while putting her face on Stanley's right shoulder.

Sure enough, Sid, Adelaide and Becca all looked at the hospital bed where Jeff was lying, and sure enough, he had passed away peacefully, and at this point, Adelaide who was a bit freaked out by seeing their deceased grandfather right before her, ran right outta the hospital room screaming and crying at the exact same time.

"Adelaide, come back, wait!" Becca called out to him while stumbling right outta the hospital room and running right down the hallway to catch up with her 6 year old daughter who had run face 1st into a cart that had ice cold water on it to be delivered to other patients in the building.

Unfortunately, Becca wasn't fast enough and Adelaide went face 1st into the cart which ran right down the hallway 'til it hit the wall at the end, toppling over above her and splashing ice cold water everywhere.

"Adelaide, are you alright?" Becca asked her when she approached her 2nd born daughter who was now lying right on the ground soaking wet and a cart nearly on top of her.

A nurse came by at that minute and saw what had happened.

"What's going on?" The nurse asked her.

"Oh thank goodness somebody's here, my 2nd born daughter, a bit freaked out over the passing of their own grandfather, ran right out into the hallway and had a bit of an accident here." Becca replied to her.

"Well let's get your daughter checked out then." The nurse said to her while getting the cart outta Adelaide's way and checking to see if she was still responsive.

she was, even though she was quite sore, but when she was on her feet, they headed right down to an examining room where she was checked out, but nothing was broken, just a few scrapes and bruises which the nurse practitioner treated. When that was finished, Becca and Adelaide went and caught up with the other Chang family members who was seeing to making the funeral arrangements for Jeff 's memories.

"What just happened to Adelaide, Becca?" Stanley asked her upon seeing their 2nd born daughter covered in bandages.

Becca went on to explain to him what had happened just as they headed right outside to catch their taxi cab back home to their apartment.

On the ride home, they had a good mourn over the loss and departure of Jeff and the taxi cab driver who was a young woman this time, began feeling terribly sorry for the Chang family's depression and sorrow. When they got back home, Becca opened up cans of chicken noodle soup for their dinner meal, but nobody was in the mood to eat much of anything, especially not Adelaide.

"It's just not fair, 1st Great Uncle Charlie left me, then my pet frog, Froggy and now Grandpa Jeff, why did he need to pass away?" Adelaide cried a bit at the dinner table.

"We still got our other pets, Adelaide." Sid said to her.

Adelaide stared at Sid dryly.

"I know that, Sid." Adelaide snapped at her.

"Adelaide, no more snapping at your older sister." Becca said to her.

"Sorry 'bout that, Mother and Daddy." Adelaide muttered to herself while taking another bite of her chicken noodle soup.

"And just like your Great Uncle Charlie, my father's now in the skies of heaven watching down on all of us, but I agree with you, Adelaide, why did he need to go so soon?" Stanley asked her while breaking down in tear drops.

"Can I be excused?" Adelaide asked them.

Becca nodded her head just as her mouth was full so Adelaide got right up from the dining room table and headed right off to her bedroom where she sat for a bit on her bed and looked right through old photographs of Sid, herself, Becca, Stanley and Jeff. The 1st photograph she opened up to in the book was taken not too long ago right before she was born. Jeff had come to visit and she saw a photograph of Stanley making a banana cream pie with him. It had been good 8 years ever since that ordeal happened and being upset by the fact that he was spending more time with Sid than he was with her. she turned over to another photograph where she, Sid and Jeff were playing together as always in the backyard the following day, then she flipped back a few pages to photographs taken of her when she and Sid were visiting Jeff. There was 1 taken of Adelaide at age 3 and a half sitting on Jeff's lap and looking at 1 of her fairy tale books

she looked at more photographs while looking at all of the photographs taken of her playing with the toys and things Jeff had given her every single year and she pulled out the last couple of years of Christmas cards Jeff had sent her, but tragically, no Christmas card came last year 'cause of the terrible health state she was in, but just as Adelaide looked at Jeff's handwriting on the cards, she couldn't stop thinking about how she never even got to tell her goodbye 'cause she was already deceased when they arrived at Perry-Conway Memorial hospital. by this point, Adelaide lost it again, silently breaking down in tear drops just as she snuggled up with her plush toy penguin and put her face right into her pillow while crying herself to sleep and never even getting undressed for bed or remembering to take her fruit flavored vitamins which was something she hadn't forgotten ever or at least just as far as she could remember.

The very next day, while Adelaide stayed home from school and Becca went to the Great Lakes City Diner, she wasn't sure what to do around here. They spent their entire day speaking about Jeff and looking at old photographs while mourning, not able to contain themselves, that afternoon, Felicia called while letting Stanley know when the funeral service would be and asking if he wanted an open or closed casket service at the wake.

"Mom, I don't know if I want it open or not." Stanley replied to Felicia on the wireless telephone just as Adelaide walked right into the upstairs washroom to get herself some ice-cold water.

"I sure hope I don't need to see Grandpa Jeff's deceased body again, that was very disturbing." Adelaide said to herself while filling up a cup of ice-cold water from the washroom faucet.

"Closed casket, please." Stanley said to Felicia on the wireless telephone while hearing Adelaide's comment.

The following day, which was a Friday, Adelaide did go back to school, even though she would've preferred to stay at home, she was gonna need to miss half a day today to go to the funeral service at the funeral home followed by the funeral service the next day, meaning they'd be staying at Felicia's house overnight so Becca and Stanley wanted her to go to school on that day.

"How's your grandfather, Adelaide?" Lisa asked her while seeing Adelaide step right up on the school bus.

She took a seat right next to her and once again, trying to hold back the tear drops. She leaned in to Lisa's right ear.

"He passed away right before we even made it to visit him in the hospital." Adelaide whispered to Lisa.

"Oh my gosh, Adelaide, I'm terribly sorry to hear that." Lisa said to her.

"Thanks a bunch, Lisa." Adelaide replied back to her.

By the time they got to school, the rest of the entire gang knew about Jeff's passing and were all feeling terribly sorry for Adelaide and the bulk of the entire day was uneventful, even though Becca had sent in a note with Adelaide to give to Francesca about having to leave early on Friday and seeing that she knew what she must be going through, giving him the weekend to study, but even Lana and Lola were feeling terribly sorry for her.

"You don't need to do that, Lana and Lola." Adelaide said to them.

"We know, Adelaide, but you need to heal, Lana and I lost our Pop-Pop last year, so we know how it really feels, you just hang in there, they'll get better in the nick of time." Lola replied to her.

The rest of the day and Friday afternoon were uneventful, just as Adelaide more or less went through the motions of going to school, preparing herself for the upcoming days ahead. During lunch time, Becca and Stanley both had their cars back, but Stanley didn't feel much like driving so Becca came to pick up Adelaide, signing her out for the afternoon and right before she knew it, they were heading right up to the funeral home an hour away from them. Adelaide had problems falling asleep the night before, so she caught herself a relaxing nap in the car on the way up there. Right after they arrived, they went right into the funeral home which was decorated in beautiful pink and white flower plants and the golden casket was closed with a photograph of Jeff sitting right on top that was near the alter. While Adelaide didn't really wish to see a photograph of Jeff especially since this was 1 of the more recent pictures when he began getting really ill, all she could think about was…

"At least I don't need to look at her deceased body again." Adelaide thought to herself while kneeling down at the alter to say some praises.

The rest of the afternoon was spent with lines of Great Lakes City residents who knew Jeff coming right up through the line and giving Adelaide and the rest of the Chang family members their condolences and showing their respects and saying how sorry they were for their loss and departure. Adelaide, wearing a black outfit which he changed into upon arriving at the funeral home, politely hugged them back and told them thanks a bunch, even though deep down, he'd much prefer to have been left alone.

If that wasn't enough, it was even harder to face Felicia's house where they were staying that evening then they had the funeral service the next day.

"Did you sleep okay, Adelaide?" Becca asked her.

Adelaide nodded her head.

"Well we'd better get a move on, they want us at the church building at 9 AM." Felicia said to them while standing up from the breakfast table and heading upstairs to prepare themselves.

They all finished their breakfast meals and went to get themselves prepared. Adelaide put back on the black outfit she wore the day before, if for no other reason, he didn't bring anything to wear. Right before they knew it, they were at the church and the funeral service shortly began afterwards. They performed several of Jeff's favorite hymns and Stanley and Felicia spoke about Stanley's late father. Adelaide also learned that the church where Stanley's funeral service was at was also the same church where their oldest cousin got married that 1 year. Then they went to the Great Lakes City Cemetery where Jeff was put down to rest in heavenly peace.

"Goodbye, Grandpa Jeff, I'll never forget about you." Adelaide said to herself while looking right up towards the skies of heaven where she believes she saw Jeff's face in the clouds. Right after the funeral service, they went to 1 of Jeff's most favorite restaurants for their lunch meals followed by a trip to the convenient store where Adelaide picked up the latest _Jungle Pals_ coloring book with that week's allowance and Stanley picked up a copy of the newspaper to have a copy of his father's obituary. Afterwards, they packed up the car and headed for home where Adelaide read her new coloring book on the way there.

Reading the coloring book cheered her up a bit and Sid commented how it was the 1st time she had seen her younger sister smiling in a few days. It was living proof that it would take a great deal of time to fully come to terms with Jeff's passing, she was on the road to recovery, but right before she could really begin the healing process, there was 1 final thing he went home and did. Later that Saturday afternoon, she got together a little box and placed inside the 1st set of toy figurines he gave her as a young 3 year old girl. Along with those photos of their past years, she also put in there, the Christmas cards he sent her over the years, and on the very top of the stack, she cut out the obituary from the newspaper and laid it right on top. When everything was inside, he closed the box and placed it on the shelf in his closet.

"Goodbye, Grandpa Jeff, you'll always be in our hearts and minds." Adelaide said to herself while waving to the box and closing her closet door.

She went right downstairs to the living room where she found Sid along with Becca and Stanley watching their show on television. she took a seat right next to them on the sofa. When a television commercial came on, Adelaide looked over to see Sid sitting right next to her and smiling at her as well.

"Are You feeling any better, Adelaide?" Sid asked her.

"Yeah, Sid, Daddy's absolutely right, Grandpa Jeff's up in the skies of heaven watching over us just like Great Uncle Charlie is." Adelaide said to her.

"I'm so relieved you're feeling so much better right now, Adelaide." Sid said to her.

"So am I, I'll always miss him more than anything, but I'll never forget him and besides the mother, daddy and sister I got now, he was the closest thing we had for quite a while." Adelaide said to her.

"But Mom and Dad are still with all of us and they really love us more than anything." Sid said to her just as Becca and Stanley walked right into the room.

"We sure do." Becca said to them while she, Stanley, Sid and Adelaide were sitting right on the sofa with them.

And from that day forth, while there were minutes where Sid and Adelaide missed their Grandpa Jeff, in time, Adelaide got over the loss and departure, looking back on the memories of Jeff, with smiling faces.


End file.
